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Isn't that pretty much the British attitude toward colonial America in rebellion? Had the Brits prevailed in the war, and say that today this nation enjoyed commonwealth status ala Canada, would not the names Washington, Jefferson and Adams be associated with attempted treason?
exactly correct.
once the dust has settled after the bloody parts then diplomacy (and of course commerce) will come into play with cooler heads taking over. But before then?
another word to use is insurrection...
well, at least until they have started to hand out uniforms
I was hoping you might critique what I wrote in post #15 as I think it is a rather interesting position that Chase did allude to in his decision and has since been backed by several others. I am not a Civil War expert by any means, but Political Science was my background and this was an often discussed topic.
Essentially, since the Constitution was created by "the People" and submitted to by the states and federal government, secession was an impossibility absent the consent of the "People" to it. Therefore the states never actually seceded, but simply rebelled.
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Since my argument is that no answer to the legality of secession may be found in the Constitution, obviously my position is that the rightness or wrongness of secession cannot be determined legally.
As for the morality of secession, there are points for and against it. My major moral objection to it is what I reference as the "spoil sport" aspect. After three decades of throwing around a disproportionate amount of political weight, the South lost an election. As long as electoral outcomes were going their way, they were satisfied with the majority rule concept which they had embraced when they ratified the Constitution. When an electoral outcome finally went against them, then they decided to take their ball and go home. In this view, secession is very much akin to someone knocking over the chess board when checkmated.
The Southern states agreed to a contractual relationship with the Northern ones. I do not see any action or behavior on the part of the Northern States which was extra legal and in violation of the contract. When pro slavery, Southern friendly presidents were elected one after another from 1828 through 1856, the North didn't announce that they were tearing up the contract. They didn't walk out because the South had been exercising a defacto veto power over the nominees of both parties. They accepted their losses and continued to fight to get one of their own elected. Finally they prevailed...and there went the chessboard.
I do not pretend that the newly elected GOP wasn't a threat to the South. It was. Putting an end to the expansion of slavery was definitely going to have a negative impact on the South in both economic and political terms. The question then hinges on whether or not the Northerners had a right to do this. Under the government under which all were living, they did indeed have such a right. The entire concept was majority rule. The Southern states accepted this...until they decided not to accept it.
The other moral argument on behalf of the north is a commonsense/pragmatic one. No nation has ever included in its founding documents, language which spelled out the means for dissolving that government. So, it is fairly safe to assert that all nations intended national political unions to be perpetual. Hell, even the Confederate Constitution spelled out that the CSA was intended as a perpetual union, no ambiguity there at all.
On the Southern moral side, one may point to Jefferson and the American Revolution as having established the right to revolt when government ceased to serve the people as they desired. It is difficult to argue that a nation founded on the idea of sovereignty resting with the people, cannot be further modified by the people.
But....I would add to the above that it was a right to revolt, not some entitlement to a peaceful departure with no objections from the majority. Even if one concedes the justice of the Southern cause, they still had an obligation to go out and win, they had no right to an expectation of a bloodless departure. Indeed, they never really attempted to depart in any recognized legal manner which would have involved permission from the majority of the nation, not merely assertion and action by individual states.
Then I must make do denied the solace of your support. Economics was a subset of politics in the prevailing circumstances. The key is to focus on the immediate trigger for secession...a threat to the ongoing expansion of slavery, which we may correctly read as a threat to the Southern power in the Senate which was very much out of proportion to their population numbers.
Its clear that what we have here is a difference of personal opinion for which, of course, there is little chance of resolution.
However, I do believe you made part of my point for me. It is a matter of record that, for any given conflict, that which "triggers" said conflict is not necessarily the same as that which is (or was) the primary cause of the conflict. In this instance, and as you said, the "Southern (political) power" did not come from the Southern population numbers. Rather it came from the Southern wealth. Abolition would have essentially wiped out the Southern economy, so they reacted politically. You see, when one threatens an economically powerful region's wealth, you may rest assured that there will be political - perhaps military - consequences.
1) It is possible, however unlikely, that economic power can exist without political power.
2) It is NOT possible for political power to exist without the economic power required to establish, fuel and direct it.
In this instance, and as you said, the "Southern (political) power" did not come from the Southern population numbers. Rather it came from the Southern wealth.
Actually ..didn't it come from the bicameral aspect of the governmental structure? The two tiered legislative body was a compromise designed so that there was a balance between majority rule and the majority's ability to utterly negate the desires of the minorities. The South was able to exploit this.
Since my argument is that no answer to the legality of secession may be found in the Constitution, obviously my position is that the rightness or wrongness of secession cannot be determined legally.
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But....I would add to the above that it was a right to revolt, not some entitlement to a peaceful departure with no objections from the majority. Even if one concedes the justice of the Southern cause, they still had an obligation to go out and win, they had no right to an expectation of a bloodless departure. Indeed, they never really attempted to depart in any recognized legal manner which would have involved permission from the majority of the nation, not merely assertion and action by individual states.
I agree with your position and your arguments, however, I think that there is some grounding in the Constitution that determines the "right" of secession. If no other argument is held, the simple fact that there is no method wherein a state can withdrawal from the Union, precludes the ability of a state to do so. As I believe you correctly pointed out, absent the ability to secede the only option is revolt.
However, choosing the option of revolt cannot be expected to be met without response and legitimacy given to any governments/confederations, etc. formed following such an act. Many southern sympathizers frame the argument that since the south seceded none of the laws of the United States applied, particularly Article 10, Section 1. The truth of the matter is that upon examination the right of secession does not exist (regardless of how you try to frame it either as simply non-existent or within the terms of my argument) and therefore the full force of the laws of the United States were still in effect on the territories that rebelled.
In that sense, to direct to the OP's question, yes the southern states and those who took up arms against the United States committed treason. Calling them traitors is an accurate term and one used liberally during and after the war in reference to southerners. Their justifications are interesting to study, but of no consequence to the titling or framing of the actions that they took.
Actually ..didn't it come from the bicameral aspect of the governmental structure? The two tiered legislative body was a compromise designed so that there was a balance between majority rule and the majority's ability to utterly negate the desires of the minorities. The South was able to exploit this.
I think he was framing the term "wealth" as a proxy for slaves. The south viewed their slaves as property and were a measure of wealth. They lobbied to have this "wealth" included in the political process to buy them greater representation than they would otherwise have had. It's just a clever way of supporting the economic reasons for war argument.
The truth of the matter is that upon examination the right of secession does not exist (regardless of how you try to frame it either as simply non-existent or within the terms of my argument) and therefore the full force of the laws of the United States were still in effect on the territories that rebelled.
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The above is a restatement of the Northern position, but it ignores the other side of the coin. While there was no language which spelled out a right of secession, there was also no language which unambiguously denied such a right.
There was a reason for this. Among the major disputes at the Constitutional Convention was where ultimate sovereignty rested. The Articles goverment was unsatisfactory because it placed so many limitations on the Federal power that it was not able to respond to certain needs, especially in the area of taxes and revenues. The purpose of the Convention was to correct those problems by strengthening the central authority. This did not mean that all those who attended were in favor of making the Federal government supreme in all matters. Keep in mind that this was still the immediate post revolutionary stages of the nation and the prevailing mentality was a mistrust of government in general, and absolutist government in particular.
The Federalists, the ones with the highest interest in crafting a strong, supreme Federal structure, were quite aware that no such constitution which gave then what they wanted, was ever going to be ratified by the Southern states. Simultaneously, the Southern delegates recognized that that there was no point at all in replacing the Articles with another underpowered Federal structure and they would not have even showed up for the gathering if they had not already agreed with the idea that some strengthening was needed, but in their minds it was a limited modification which was required, not a radical one.
The problem then was to come up with a government which satisfied both sides of this dispute. The solution was vagueness. The document in finished form simply failed to unambiguously state that the Federal governement trumped all state concerns and powers not specifically listed, nor did it state that the Federal government did not do this. The reason for the absense of language was that neither side believed that ratification would take place if it had been spelled out clearly either way.
It was a compromise, and the price of that compromise was having to spend the next six decades finding more compromises to settle disputes. The Missouri Compromise was the product of that missing language, the Compromise of 1850 was a product, as was the Kansas-Nebraska Act. The nation just kept on papering over the central issue, masking it and settling for watered down temporary solutions...until such methods no longer worked. Then it was war.
That is why I am unable to embrace any arguments regarding the legality, or illegality of secession. The Constitutional writers deliberately ignored it in order to make a nation.
Isn't that pretty much the British attitude toward colonial America in rebellion? Had the Brits prevailed in the war, and say that today this nation enjoyed commonwealth status ala Canada, would not the names Washington, Jefferson and Adams be associated with attempted treason?
Probably is, and had they won they would have hung the founding fathers as Traitors. But the South had full representation in the government before it betrayed it
The above is a restatement of the Northern position, but it ignores the other side of the coin. While there was no language which spelled out a right of secession, there was also no language which unambiguously denied such a right.
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That is why I am unable to embrace any arguments regarding the legality, or illegality of secession. The Constitutional writers deliberately ignored it in order to make a nation.
I agree with you and the points you are making. However, the legal aspect of secession is often the lynch pin of most debates on the subject. The Confederate sympathizers often seek to justify what happened in the framework of the Constitution, therefore the most expedient way to counter the argument is within the framework of the Constitution. I will concede though that two people who share the same point/opinion arguing with each other is less than productive, lol. I will add though that I personally feel that one can find more to support secession to be illegal within the Constitution than you can find evidence to support it as a right.
I guess the question I would ask Confederate supporters using the Constitution to support their claims, is why didn't they just pursue legal means to address their desire to secede instead of opening fire on a Federal garrison. Since there is no clear cut answer to the legality of the issue, it would be interesting to see what the Supreme Court not influenced by the war would have seen as the legal answer.
Location: New Albany, Indiana (Greater Louisville)
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Secession by definition is treason, but the fact is complicated by the fact the the seceder usually feels that they are the pure form of what the union is supposed to be.
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